Dr. George Bagster Phillips

[Simon Wood]

Hi Tom,

What I have read suggests that Doctor Phillips knew more than he was willing/permitted to admit, but I have never thought he was duplicitous. I think he simply did his duty—whatever it might have involved. By his own admission he was not a "free agent".

Regards,

Simon

[perrymason]

Its interesting that while trying to ascertain how an accomplice might have assisted after the fact, no-one mentioned that Wideawake Hat could have been that man for Blotchy Face.

Mary Ann saw Blotchy, Sarah saw Wideawake, but nobody knows when Blotchy left. Wideawake might be the man Simon suggests.

Since were looking for an accomplice, a suspicious unknown person watching the location of a murder in progress, or soon to occur, seems to fit the bill.

And it happens when Mary might still be alive...as contrasted by Mrs Maxwells conversation with Mary the morning of the 9th.

Best regards.

[Phil Carter]

Obituary

Hello all,

Additional snippet about George Bagster Phillips, M.R.C.S., L.M.Eng., L.S.A.Lond, an obituary in the BMJ, (British Medical Journal)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2407870/?page=1

best wishes

Phil

[NotBlamedForNothing]

This is regarding the knife found by Thomas Coram on Whitechapel Road, and presented at the Stride inquest. The Daily Telegraph commented:

The production of the knife created some sensation, its discovery not having been generally known. It was a knife such as would be used by a baker in his trade, it being flat at the top instead of pointed, as a butcher's knife would be. The blade, which was discoloured with something resembling blood, was quite a foot long and an inch broad, whilst the black handle was six inches in length, and strongly rivetted in three places.

At the next day of the inquest, Dr Phillips said:

The knife that was produced on the last occasion was delivered to me properly secured by Police constable 282 H. On examination I found it to be such a knife as is used in a chandler's shop, and is called a slicing knife. It has blood upon it, which has characteristics of the blood of a warm blooded animal. It has been recently blunted, and its edge turned by rubbing apparently on a stone such as a kerbstone. It evidently before was a very sharp knife. Such a knife could have produced the incision and injuries to the neck, but it is not such a weapon as I should have chosen to inflict the injuries in the present case; and if my opinion as regards the position of the body is correct, the knife in question would become an improbable instrument to have caused the incision.

So the knife had mammalian blood on it, even though it had been blunted, apparently recently.
Prior to being rubbed on a stone, it was evident (somehow), that the knife had been very sharp.
Phillips then gave the reason for supposing it improbable that this was the knife used to make the incision...

I have come to a conclusion as to the incision and also the perpetrator or the deed. I affirm that she was seized by the shoulder placed on the ground, and that the perpetrator of the deed was on her right side when he inflicted the cut. I am of opinion that the cut was made from the left to the right of the deceased, and therefore arises the unlikelihood of such a long knife causing the wound in the neck, taking into account the position of the incision. The knife I have seen was rounded at the point.

So essentially the knife would have been too unwieldy to have been the murder weapon, given both the position of the victim relative to the murderer, and the position of the incision - which starts on the left, the same side as she was laying.
Phillips also describes the knife as rounded at the point.

The discovery of the knife was reported in the London Evening News, Oct 1:

A KNIFE FOUND IN WHITECHAPEL-ROAD.

Early this morning a police-constable was passing on his beat in the Whitechapel-road, when he came upon a black-handled knife, keen as a razor, and pointed like a carving-knife. The blade was ten inches long, about the length of weapon assumed by Dr. Phillips to have been used by the Hanbury-street murderer. It is looked upon by the police as supplying a link in the "man from Southampton arrest."

Black handle, ten inch blade, razor sharp, and pointed like a carving knife.

Fanny Mortimer: I was just about going to bed, sir, when I heard a call for the police. I ran to the door, and before I could open it I heard somebody say, 'Come out quick; there's a poor woman here that's had ten inches of cold steel in her.'

[Observer]

The knife in question was blunt, and round ended. Isn't it time for you to stop winding up the genuine posters who contribute to this forum?

[NotBlamedForNothing]

The knife in question was blunt, and round ended.

An LEN reporter viewed the deceased at the mortuary...

The cut in the woman's neck is not exactly as has been described by our morning contemporaries. It is not from ear to ear. The knife seems to have been stabbed in deeply at the left side to reach the external carotid, and to have emerged at the carotid on the right side. The superficial length of the wound is from three-and-a-half to four inches.

Stabbed in deeply at the left side, apparently.
Okay, so that is from a reporter, not a medical person.
So let's look at both Phillips and Blackwell, at the inquest...

Baxter: The knife produced on the last occasion was not sharp pointed, was it?

That Wynne, is a loaded question.

Phillips: No, it was rounded at the tip, which was about an inch across. The blade was wider at the base.
Baxter: Was there anything to indicate that the cut on the neck of the deceased was made with a pointed knife?
Phillips: Nothing.

So the issue with the knife produced, was not that the end was rounded, but that it was too long, given the circumstances.
Fairly clear so far. However...

Blackwell: With respect to the knife which was found, I should like to say that I concur with Dr. Phillips in his opinion that, although it might possibly have inflicted the injury, it is an extremely unlikely instrument to have been used. It appears to me that a murderer, in using a round-pointed instrument, would seriously handicap himself, as he would be only able to use it in one particular way. I am told that slaughterers always use a sharp-pointed instrument.

So Blackwell 'concurred' with Phillips, by contradicting him on the likely nature of the knife used - round vs sharp-pointed.
Yet that must also mean Blackwell considered the cut to have possibly been made with a sharp-pointed knife - putting him at odds with Phillips, who said there was no evidence of a sharp-pointed knife, by the nature of the wound.
Blackwell seems to be implying that the cut commenced with a stabbing action - rather than a shear - so in effect, agreeing with the LEN reporter.

Baxter: No one has suggested that this crime was committed by a slaughterer.

Just as no one has suggested (at the inquest, so far) that there were any grapes found in the yard or on the body, yet for some reason Baxter soon starts asking Blackwell these sort of questions.

Blackwell: I simply intended to point out the inconvenience that might arise from using a blunt-pointed weapon.

So after considering both doctor's testimony, it would seem the nature of the knife used, is unclear.
However, there is still the huge anomaly between the Oct 1 press reports, which stated the knife found was as keen as a razor, and Phillips claiming that knife had recently been blunted on stone.

Isn't it time for you to stop winding up the genuine posters who contribute to this forum?

If quoting from press reports has the effect of winding up some posters, then I would suggest that those posters are not as genuine as you or they suppose they are.

[Observer]

Let me start by quoting, in bold, this section from your post #79

"The discovery of the knife was reported in the London Evening News, Oct 1:

A KNIFE FOUND IN WHITECHAPEL-ROAD.

Early this morning a police-constable was passing on his beat in the Whitechapel-road, when he came upon a black-handled knife, keen as a razor, and pointed like a carving-knife. The blade was ten inches long, about the length of weapon assumed by Dr. Phillips to have been used by the Hanbury-street murderer. It is looked upon by the police as supplying a link in the "man from Southampton arrest."

Black handle, ten inch blade, razor sharp, and pointed like a carving knife.

Fanny Mortimer: I was just about going to bed, sir, when I heard a call for the police. I ran to the door, and before I could open it I heard somebody say, 'Come out quick; there's a poor woman here that's had ten inches of cold steel in her.'"


What exactly is you point(pun intended) here? You didn't qualify this "revelation"

It's plain to me that the reporter has either not seen the knife as found by the PC, or is exaggerating it's appearance. Where did you get the quote from Mrs Mortimer? If by the same reporter might I suggest that he seems to be putting words into Mr's Mortimers mouth

But again, I fail to see the point you are making above. It's obvious that the knife found by the PC was not the knife used to murder Liz Stride.

[Observer]

By the way, most of us realise that some of the press reports pertaining to the Whitechapel murders are a joke. You might want to take that on board

[Observer]

"It's plain to me that the reporter has either not seen the knife as found by the PC, or is exaggerating it's appearance."

This isn't very clear, what I meant to say was, regardless of whether the reporter saw the knife in question or not he's exaggerating it's appearance.

[Scott Nelson]

Knife probably left by David Cohen on kerb next to Norah Christmas' laundry premise. Then Cohen goes inside, next door at Gertrude Smith's brothel at 254 Whitechapel Road. Leave an incriminating piece of evidence practically at one's doorstep? Who knows what goes through a deranged mind?

[poliwog]

Hope someone is alert to this. The obituary states the Phillips was an MRCS. Shouldn't he then be Mister Phillips rather than Doctor? (Forgive an ignorant Yank.)

[Kattrup]

Hope someone is alert to this. The obituary states the Phillips was an MRCS. Shouldn't he then be Mister Phillips rather than Doctor? (Forgive an ignorant Yank.)

Hi poliwog

MRCS means Member of the Royal College of Surgeons, the organization in charge of exams and licenses for doctors wishing to practice as surgeons. Being a member means Philips was a doctor who was qualified as a surgeon and could perform surgery.

So his title as Dr. was entirely correct

[poliwog]

Hi poliwog

MRCS means Member of the Royal College of Surgeons, the organization in charge of exams and licenses for doctors wishing to practice as surgeons. Being a member means Philips was a doctor who was qualified as a surgeon and could perform surgery.

So his title as Dr. was entirely correct

I was basing my belief on the following:

In Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles, the distinction is made in the following conversation:

"Come, come, we are not so far wrong after all," said Holmes. "And now, Dr. James Mortimer—"

"Mister, sir, Mister—a humble M.R.C.S."

But as usual, it's more complicated. Wikipedia gives this explanation:

The correct way to address a member or fellow of The Royal College of Surgeons is to use the title Mr, Miss, Mrs, Ms, or Mx (not Dr). This system (which applies only to surgeons, not physicians) has its origins in the 16th century, when surgeons were barber-surgeons and did not have a medical degree (or indeed any formal qualification), unlike physicians, who, by the 18th century, held a university medical degree and could thus be referred to as "Doctor". By the time the College of Surgeons received its Royal Charter in 1800, the Royal College of Physicians were insisting that candidates for membership for the college of Surgeons must have a medical degree first.^[4] Therefore, the ensuing years saw aspiring surgeons having to study medicine first and hence receive the title Doctor. Thereafter, having obtained the diploma of Member or Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons he would revert to the title "Mr" as a snub to the RCP. Nowadays the title "Mr" is used by Members of the College who have passed the diploma MRCS examination and the College addresses Members as "Mr" or "Ms".^[

[etenguy]

Taken from the website of the Royal College of Surgeons re the present day - the exams and regimes at different points in time had different names and meanings (https://www.rcseng.ac.uk/patient-car...%20title%20'Mr'. )

Why are surgeons in the UK called Mr/Miss/Ms/Mrs, rather than Dr?


In most other parts of the world all medical practitioners, physicians and surgeons alike, are referred to as Dr while in the UK surgeons are usually referred to as Mr/Miss/Ms/Mrs. This is because, from the Middle Ages physicians had to embark on formal university training to gain possession of a degree in medicine before they could enter practice. The possession of this degree, a doctorate, entitled them to the title of ‘Doctor of Medicine’ or Doctor.

The training of surgeons until the mid-19th century was different. They did not have to go to university to gain a degree; instead they usually served as an apprentice to a surgeon. Afterwards they took an examination. In London, after 1745, this was conducted by the Surgeons' Company and after 1800 by The Royal College of Surgeons. If successful they were awarded a diploma, not a degree, therefore they were unable to call themselves 'Doctor', and stayed instead with the title 'Mr'.

Outside London and in the largest cities, the surgeon served as an apprentice like many other tradesmen, but did not necessarily take any examination. Today all medical practitioners, whether physicians or surgeons have to undertake training at medical school to obtain a qualifying degree. Thereafter a further period of postgraduate study and training through junior posts is required before full consultant surgeon status is achieved. Thus the tradition of a surgeon being referred to as Mr/Miss/Ms/Mrs has continued, meaning that in effect a person starts as Mr/Miss/Ms/Mrs, becomes a Dr and then goes back to being a Mr/Miss/Ms/Mrs again!